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Dungeons

What is a dungeon? From a utilitarian perspective: A training ground. One can run about in the real world killing things (monsters, humans, random animals), but there are consequences. Even systemized worlds need ecosystems. If people wander around killing everything, the ecosystem will collapse. Dungeons are for training. One can kill everything inside without worrying…

Enlightened, Monsters, and Animals

I’m not a big fan of the term “enlightened races”, but it exists and it’s convenient, so I’m adopting it. This refers to those races who naturally (without system fuckery) form societies. Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Aliens, etc… This is not quite synonymous with “sapient”. Leaving aside the offspring question (i.e. are human babies sapient? It’s…

How Does Magic Work?

This comes up in the context of a fight scene in Industrial Mage. Our intrepid hero casts a tornado-ish air shield around himself and it moves with him. Instead of a fireball, he creates a fire-whip, which behaves mostly like an actual whip. He casts water bullets at the bad spider creature, targeting the joints,…